


Safer Than Fries

by micehell



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-10-31
Updated: 2005-10-31
Packaged: 2017-11-12 04:14:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/486571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/micehell/pseuds/micehell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Why John became a pilot.  Really.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Safer Than Fries

When John was sixteen, he decided he wanted to be a football player. The coach took one look at all 5'10", 135 pounds of him and laughed, but John was determined.

He was also determined that he was going to be the quarterback. Though he usually did his best to hide it, he was good at seeing patterns, at thinking fast, and he just knew he was going to be best quarterback since Unitas.

And John was great. He knew just what play to call, and had such natural charisma that his team followed his lead even when the coach yelled at him for ignoring his calls again. And John had a great eye, his brain instinctively doing the vector analysis that allowed him to get the ball right to his teammates, even when they had to run in twisting lines to avoid their opponents' hands.

His coach, still muttering about his not being able to follow instructions, decided to let him start if he gained at least five pounds by their first game, giving him just under three weeks to do it.

John had a bad start the first week, losing two pounds, not to mention twenty dollars worth of Burger King's best and half a day hunched over a toilet, but he finally managed to gain back the two plus another four and a half pounds right under the wire. The missing half pound almost cost him, but after a lot of begging, and having to listen to the coach complain about lucky bastards who didn't appreciate a good metabolism when they had it, John finally got the nod.

It was almost ten minutes into the first quarter before the Bear's offensive squad was needed, and John got to take the field. The Wildcats were up fourteen points already, but John was sure he could turn that around.

He had a gain of thirty yards in the first play alone, and John was floating on air when it started.

One of the defensive ends called out to him across the line of scrimmage, "Hey, pretty boy. Better cover your ass, or I'll cover it for you." He gave an exaggerated thrust of his hips, just in case there were any deaf or dead people around who might have missed his meaning.

John just smirked, having heard much worse from his own team, and went on to throw for a touchdown.

They were eight minutes into the second quarter before John got to take the field again, and the Bears were down by another fourteen, but John still had some vague hope of getting a win, if he could just figure out some way of keeping their defensive team off the field.

"Hey, pretty boy, I'm coming for you. Over and over, just for you."

It was the same defensive end, and even his own team groaned at that one. "Give it a rest, Randy," came from one the tackles.

Randy laughed, and blew him a kiss. John smirked, and shot him a bird. And then threw for sixty yards and another touchdown.

Three minutes into the third quarter, and one of the Bear's players had got turned around, running in the wrong direction before his own team took him down. It left them just seven yards from their own goal when John took the field. Not that there was any pressure or anything, considering that they were down another seven points by this time. But John still kind of vaguely had hope, especially if the Wildcat's offensive squad all suddenly got sick or something. Or the Bear's defensive squad did.

"Hey, pretty boy." Randy again, but John again ignored him.

"Gonna fuck you up, pretty boy. Gonna. Fuck. You." And then with another big play of hips, "Up."

"Give it a rest, Randy," came from one of the other tackles, a snort from John's center, and a "Sorry, I like my men sarcastic and brilliant, you'll have to just keep playing with yourself," from John himself.

John never did get back his memory of the rest of the game, but he was assured by many people that he played great right up until the point that Randy Miller, 6'2", 210 pounds of Wildcat defensive end, sacked him so hard he flew back into the goal post, football still in hand, earning the Wildcats two more points, and earning John a broken leg and a concussion.

While he was stuck in the hospital, his leg in traction and his vision doubled, John came to the conclusion that football was really more fun as a spectator sport.

::::::::::

After the cast came off and he finally finished his physical therapy, John started looking for a new goal in life. Nothing was coming to him, but that was probably because he was being unrealistic. It was something his father mentioned frequently; long, long lectures about how he needed to get his head out of the clouds and into real life.

So when Darrell said that he could get John a job at Burger King, and that even though he'd have to start with the fries, Darrell was sure he'd be promoted to the drive-through window in no time flat, John decided to take it. From fries to the window, to manager to owner, he'd trace a path up that led to financial success. His father would be impressed at least.

His first day at the job, his boss, Debbie, leaned over the counter, her arms pressed close together, making her 44 DDs push out like alien pods about to burst, and told him she appreciated how hot he was... keeping the oil. John smiled warily, taking a step back just in case his body heat might trigger the alien invasion.

It was that step back that was the big mistake, because instead of having his chest bored out by aliens, he wound up slipping on some oil. He went down in a awkward rush, his hand still on the fries basket, causing them to go flying all over the kitchen, pelting his coworkers like some kind of hot potato claymore.

There were only some minor burns, and John's sprained ankle, but he'd had a lot of practice getting around on one leg, and he didn't miss any time at work at all.

Over the weekend came the slight mishap with the ketchup dispensers (which necessitated his wearing an eye patch), the salt packet fiasco (which, besides his own bruised ribs, unfortunately wound up getting on one of Debbie's potato burns, though she assured him she was all right after she stopped cursing), and then the milkshake debacle (three broken fingers, plus the headache from drinking the milkshake too fast).

After Tuesday, and the Incident With The Trash Compactor, which became a local legend, John's doctor started driving a brand new sports car, and Debbie, with a sigh that moved mountains, or set them to jiggling anyway, suggested that the food industry wasn't for everyone. John just nodded as well as he could with the neck brace.

::::::::::

The lights above the stage were kind of pretty from this angle, John thought as he waited for the pain to die down to bearable levels. Though the brilliant arcs of light he was seeing probably had more to do with his likely concussion than any native beauty of the bare bulbs.

He thought about getting off the stage, or at least sitting up, but the pain in his head got worse even thinking about it, so he lay there, holding the warm thought of suing all the musicians who had ever written any of those whiny ass songs about how tough their lives were and yet had never once mentioned the danger of the audience actually rioting tightly to his chest.

John shivered, and remembered he didn't have a shirt on. He braved a twitch of his head that sort of let him look down at his bare chest. The rest of the band had laughed at him for going out on stage without a shirt own, ribbing him about trying to steal all the groupies with his peach-fuzz chest hair, which at seventeen was finally coming in, but it had turned out to be John's best decision of the evening. If he'd been wearing a shirt, it would have been toast considering the amount of blood that was mixing with the oil and glitter across his chest, and, well, those had seemed like a good idea at the time, too, though not so much now. John carefully touched the nose that had provided the blood, and decided it wasn't broken, though it was a near thing. Who would have thought such a tiny woman could pack such a mean punch?

And, okay, maybe playing Johnny Cash in a metal bar hadn't been his best decision ever, but... the thought trailed off as his headache grew and the room lurched, even though _he_ hadn't moved. Then he did have to move, trying not to throw up all over himself, which, yeah, good decision there even if the execution wasn't all he could have hoped for. Whoever had to clean the stage wasn't going to be happy with John.

An hour later, dumping the cleaning bucket full of water and vomit and some other things that he wasn't going to think about in the alley behind the bar, his knees aching as much as the rest of him now, and $10 in wet, scraggly bills his only monetary reward for the whole evening, John decided that being a musician was highly overrated.

::::::::::

The recruiter gave him a smile full of bonhomie, his handshake firm and strong, inviting him to sit with a wave of his hand and a hearty, "Call me Steve, John, we're all friends here." John worked very hard not to roll his eyes.

After handing out coffee and danish, which were so good that John actually did feel friendly, at least until the danishes were gone, Steve sat at his desk, elaborately casual. He tried to keep eye-contact, but Steve's gaze kept getting drawn back down to the folder before him, John's Academy application and test scores on top.

John had had a dog once, who he'd had to beg and plead and promise his soul for, but it had been worth it, because Duke had been the best dog ever... except when John was eating. Then Duke would sit and stare at every bite John took like he was about to die and that one bite of food was all that could save him. Steve was looking at his test scores with that same look, and it made John feel odd, both cocky and nervous, that the things he'd tried so hard to hide for so much of his life would all of a sudden be a magic key.

Steve asked him a bunch of questions about his schooling and background, all of which were on the application, but John answered them with almost no trace of sarcasm, fighting his fuck-this instinct with everything he had.

But just when John thought it was over, that the last test was finally done, Steve's voice turned overly-serious, his face taking on the same expression that Jerry Lewis' had when he'd say, 'Only you can help,' every year on Labor Day. "John, why do you want to be a pilot? Why do you want to risk your life to serve your country this way?"

A thousand and one answers came to John, from the facetious to the truly bizarre, but in the end the truth won out. "I figured if riding a Ferris wheel was good, then flying a plane had to be great. And, hell, it can't be any riskier than serving fries."

Steve's face now looked just like John's father's did right before he started throwing things, but the eyes dropped back down to the test scores, and the face went neutral as a hand was extended. "Welcome to the Air Force, John. Welcome to the Air Force."

 

/story


End file.
